Toyota to invest $80 million for Huntsville plant expansion to boost V6 production

Toyota Motor Corp. will spend around $80 million for the expansion of its Huntsville facility in Alabama to produce additional V6 engines for the market in the United States, the automaker disclosed. The new 300,000-square-foot building will commence production in March 2014, Toyota said. This facility will enable its Alabama unit to manufacture an additional 216,000 V6 engines annually, boosting its capacity by 148% and enabling it to produce more than 362,000 units per year.

At present, the Huntsville facility assembles 700,000 4-cylinder, V8 and V6 engines each year for eight North American-built Toyota units, the company said.

The expansion project will boost the plant's total annual engine production capacity to 916,000 units. It will also increase annual engine production capacity to 1.4 million for all U.S. operations. In addition, Toyota assembles engines in West Virginia and Kentucky. The automaker disclosed that the expansion would generate around 125 new jobs, raising the number of employees at the facility to 1,150.

Moreover, the expansion increases the total amount of funds that the automaker has invested in the facility to at least $700 million since 2003, when it opened in 2003.

Executive Vice President Steve St. Angelo at Toyota Motor Engineering & Manufacturing North America commented that the V6 line addition "continues to reflect" the increasing "optimism for an improving North American market." He further stated that they will continue to study "more localization in North America."

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